Preserve by flora & farmer - Winnipeg

Kim Bialkoski, owner of both Preserve and flora & farmer, our own housemade line of preserves, fell in love with cooking as a child, and that love organically lead to an interest and investment in food security as she grew into an adult.

After many years working in the food industry, a serious bike accident changed her life and was the catalyst for her obsession with canning.

Working around her injuries, often preserving late into the night after her son went to bed, she developed the recipes you can still find on Preserve’s shelves.

Using her culinary creativity she was passionate to create “delightfully daring preserves” and attended her first farmers market where she sold nearly 200 jars and earned rave reviews from customers.

This support motivated her to officially begin flora & farmer, and after quickly outgrowing her home kitchen and years of renting commercial kitchens, the opportunity to build her own facility with a storefront was seized and opened in December 2018.

Recognizing the need for increased accessibility to local quality food, a desire for community connection, and with her own experiences and challenges as a small food producer, she gladly brought in other Manitoba made products from vendors she met over the years at farmers markets and craft sales, without the demands larger grocers place over them to aid in their success.

Mindful that the store would be so much more than her own preserves, calling it flora & farmer just didn’t fit the bill, and the name Preserve was born.  A play on the word, the shop offers far more than spreads and pickles but seeks to “Preserve the local economy” with handmade foods and goods while cultivating relationships with customers and community.